The Impact of Digitization on Business Operations
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Item The Smartphone as the Incumbent “Thing” among the Internet of Things(2019-01-08) MacCrory, Frank; Katsamakas, EvangelosThe smartphone has been the ubiquitous computing platform in the past decade. However, emerging consumer Internet of Things (IoT) technology trends, such as smartwatches and smart speakers, promise the establishment of new ubiquitous platforms. We model two competing horizontally-differentiated platforms that each offer a smartphone and another smart device. This market diverges markedly from standard mixed bundling results when devices from the same vendor have super-additive utility. We show that the degree of a smart device’s differentiation (relative to the smartphone) is the prime factor determining if it is profitable to deepen integration between a smart device with the incumbent smartphone platform. We provide managerial insights for technology strategy.Item Operational Impact of mHealth Adoption in Clinical Practice(2019-01-08) Rajan, Balaraman; Agnihothri, SaligramaChronic conditions place a high cost burden on the healthcare system and deplete the quality of life for millions of Americans. There is significant medical literature that shows that continuous monitoring of patient health at home with the addition of provider support, improves patient health. Digital innovations such as mHealth technology can be used to provide efficient, effective, and patient centered healthcare. However, implementing mHealth technology can significantly change the composition of clinical staff and patient flow. In this paper, we evaluate the trade-offs of implementing mHealth technology in a clinical practice.Item Does Telemedicine Reduce ED Congestion? Evidence from New York State(2019-01-08) Sun, Shujing; Lu, Susan (Feng); Rui, HuaxiaOvercrowding in emergency departments (EDs) is a common yet nagging problem. It is not only costly for hospitals but also compromises care quality and patient experience. Hence, finding effective ways to improve ED efficiency is of great importance. Using a large dataset of New York State, we investigate the role of telemedicine in enhancing ED efficiency. We show that on average, ED telemedicine adoption significantly reduces patients' length of stay by 15.3% and waiting time by 9.6%. Such an effect is not a byproduct of other widely adopted health IT applications. Interestingly, the effect of telemedicine is larger for less severe patients or when the ED is at a higher occupancy level. Also, we show that the efficiency improvement does not come at the expense of care quality or patient cost. Therefore, our research points to telemedicine as a potential cost-efficient solution to alleviate ED overcrowding.Item Racial Discrimination in Social Media Customer Service: Evidence from a Popular Microblogging Platform(2019-01-08) Gunarathne, Priyanga; Rui, Huaxia; Seidmann, AbrahamThe concept of racial inequality has existed from the early days of service provision, with evidence dating back to ancient civilizations. While the emergence of the Internet and social media has drastically transformed almost every aspect of everyday life, including the intrinsic values of social relationships, the impact of racial disparities on receiving services on online platforms is not so evident. Although many consumer brands provide customer service on social media today, little is known regarding the prevalence and magnitude of racial discrimination in the context of social media customer service. Thus, in this study, we examine the existence and the extent of racial discrimination against African-Americans in social media customer service. We analyzed all complaints to seven major U.S. airlines on Twitter for a period of nine months. Interestingly, our empirical analysis finds that African-American customers are less likely to receive brand responses to their complaints on social media. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to empirically analyze the racial discrimination phenomenon in the context of social media customer service.Item Aggregation Bias(2019-01-08) Nakkas, Alper; Chen, Kay Yut; Zhang, JieWe propose an axiomatic approach to a decision maker’s information aggregation problem. This axiomatic analysis provides a positive model of the decision maker’s evidence assessment process, wherein submitted credible evidence is aggregated into an overall assessment that is responsive to the individual assessments provided. We show that the axiomatic approach produces a two-parameter family of functions and the parameters of the aggregation function have natural interpretations as the decision maker’s bias against the information provider’s report and the breadth of the interpretation of the decision maker’s perspective. We consider two different applications and provide empirical evidence that the decision makers use this form of information aggregation in practice.Item Organic Advertising? The Effect of Featured Review on Consumer Rating(2019-01-08) Wu, Tong; Seidmann, Abraham; Rui, HuaxiaWe investigate the effect of the Favorite Reviews (FR) feature on user behavior in an online user-generated content (UGC) platform. The FR feature, which allows business owners to pin one selected review near the top of their property page, can serve as a new advertising tool for business owners to promote their businesses using satisfied consumers. Specifically, this paper investigates the impact of such a feature on the quantity of new reviews on TripAdvisor.com. Relying on difference-in-differences strategies, we find that this feature distorts the distribution of new reviews toward a positive extreme. The observed growth in new five-bubble reviews is mainly driven by new users. The experienced users, however, reduce their contributions, on average. This observed effect might result in user concern over the credibility of the UGC platform.Item Reducing Costs of Managing Medication Inventory in Automated Dispensing System in Hospital Units(2019-01-08) Dobson, Gregory; Tilson, Vera; Sullivan, Sandy; Webster, DaveHospital pharmacies utilize automated dispensing systems (ADS) to store and dispense medication in hospital wards. We propose an algorithm to minimize the inventory management costs incurred in holding and refilling the medications stored in an ADS. The algorithm is a linear integer programming formulation to compute how to configure an ADS, and how to allocate medications into capacity-constrained containers. Using a numerical example with real hospital data we demonstrate significant percentage savings relative to the status quo.Item Dynamics of Assignee Networks: A New Approach for Measuring the Impact on Patent Value Based on Network Analysis(2019-01-08) Wan, Fang; Seidmann, AbrahamThis article outlines a network approach to the study of impact factors of patent value. Firms protect their property right of each innovation as the assignee of the patent. Advanced technological capabilities constitute a major resource for firms trying to achieve and maintain competitive advantages. Firms are also assessed by the overall value of its intellectual properties, especially the patents. Researchers have been trying to quantify patent value and study the related influence factors. Among all the characteristics of patents, citations represent the knowledge flows between innovations. This information can be used to measure and track the significance of each patent. The activity of a firm citing patents from other firms during a patent application indicates its R&D intention and interest, creating a strategical link between the assignees of the involved patents. In this study, a new approach of studying the impact of an assignees role on patent value by network analysis is proposed. Our analysis showed that in-degree centrality and betweenness centrality of an assignees position in the interaction network have a significant impact on its patent value, while the effect of out-degree centrality is inconclusive. This approach provides a perspective of assessing the overall patent value of a firm, which can serve as a reference for managerial purpose of allocating firm resources and investments.Item Economics of Information Processing in Operations Organizations(2019-01-08) Lederer, PhilThis paper studies a fundamental management question: how does information economics affect the organization of management? We view management hierarchies as tree-like structures designed to minimize real and opportunity costs related to information processing and decision making. “Line” production activities stand at the end nodes of a hierarchy tree. Data from these bottom nodes are processed and distributed to higher level nodes that combine information from the lower nodes. The question we ask is: “how do the real and opportunity costs of information processing affect the tree”. We solve for the optimal tree which includes the links and capacity at each of the nodes. Models are formulated on two underlying premises: complexity costs arise due to processing different types of data, and queuing effects due to data arrival and processing uncertainties create delay which is an opportunity cost.Item Simulation Model to Study Provider Capacity Release Schedules under Time-Varying Demand Rate for Acute Appointments, Demand for Follow-Up Appointments, and Time-Dependent No Show Rate(2019-01-08) Yuan, Fangzheng; Tilson, Vera; Szmerekovsky, Joseph; Spurr, RyanWe address the problem of scheduling patient appointments in a family medicine clinic. A significant barrier to a clinic’s sustainability is under-utilization of the medical providers it employs. Practically all patient appointments are scheduled some time in advance (from an hour to months ahead), and under-utilization happens because some patients do not keep their appointments and do not provide sufficient notice for the clinic to reschedule another patient into the freed slot. Using a stylized simulation model we investigate an algorithm for appointment capacity release that increases provider utilization.